like it's only you and me
by LadyMoriel
Summary: They do Starbucks before they do pizza. Alice and Hatter, adjusting.


_This was my fic for Yuletide 2016, originally posted on AO3 near the end of December. The original prompt was "The ability and knowledge to travel between two worlds and learning to navigate that shifting would be an awesome but challenging life. Mostly I'm interested in a post-movie version where Alice and Hatter keep some connection to magic instead of just slotting into her world forever. Negotiations and politics would be lovely." For various reasons, this is not quite that, or at least it isn't yet; instead it's effectively a preview/treat that will be expanded soon._

* * *

It doesn't take Alice long to start asking some of the really obvious questions—only as long as it takes to offer Mrs. Hamilton some halfway plausible excuses about having gone to school together ages ago and yeah, wow, what a weird coincidence that he just happened to be there when she needed help, wasn't it? and then get out of the apartment to talk.

Well, technically the first question is "We have tea shops here but they don't sell weird magic drugs. Well, coffee shops, anyway. There's a Starbucks nearby, you want to try that?" Hatter doesn't know what a Starbucks is and doesn't particularly care, as long as he's with her, so he shrugs and follows her down the sidewalk.

After only a few steps, she looks at him sort of sideways, smiling a little, and says, "I thought you were staying in Wonderland."

"Hah, well, me too," he says. "And then I changed my mind, and here we are."

"So how long did it take you to change your mind?"

He rubs the back of his neck. "Um. About 30 seconds? Give or take. Especially when I realized they'd cocked it all up, the way they sent you through, and of course nobody else wanted to test to make sure they'd actually got it right the second time. So I volunteered."

Alice frowns. "You know, it didn't occur to me, but I didn't hear about loads of other people mysteriously ending up in the hospital. That would've made the news."

"Yep, that's 'cause they didn't," Hatter says. "See, normally, you've got two types of people traveling through the looking glass—sedated oysters or people from Wonderland who've done it a million times and know exactly what they're doing, but of course you were neither, so it was calibrated all wrong. So the damn thing coughed you out on the other end so hard you hit the wall and get knocked out. They realized pretty much right away, got it all fixed up properly for the rest of the oysters, but you took it right on the noggin first. Took me a few minutes to find you, even, that was…not fun. Oh, hello, here we are." The giant STARBUCKS sign above the café door is hard to miss, even if he still doesn't know what a Starbucks is. He holds the door open for Alice. "Free wi-fi, that's…handy, I'm sure."

"Thanks," she says, looking amused. "Don't worry, I'll tell you everything you need to know."

There are only a few people inside, most of them sitting by themselves at various tables, wearing headphones and bending over—well, he can see screens and keyboards, so probably computers, even if they don't look exactly like what he's used to. Alice goes up to the counter to order, and Hatter hangs back, trying not to look like he doesn't know what he's doing. (Not so much _trying not to_ , to be fair; he learned a long time ago how to keep his head down and observe a situation without drawing attention. Kind of important, if you wanted to survive on Wonderland's streets.)

Alice comes back with two drinks in tall, lidded paper cups and nods to the nearest empty table. Once they're seated, she pushes one drink across the table toward him. "This is our kind of tea. It's just Earl Grey with a little sugar, and technically it's a drug because there's some caffeine in it, but it's not like your tea."

The cup is warm in his hands and the liquid inside almost scalds his tongue when he takes a sip. It's mostly bitter, slightly sweet. "Oh yeah, we have stuff like this too. I mean, we used to, that's where the name came from, although nine times out of ten when somebody talks about tea nowadays they mean, you know, the other kind. What did you get?"

"It's just a mocha. Coffee with chocolate syrup. Want to try?"

"Sure, what the hell." He takes a sip from her cup too before passing it back—a little bitter, a lot sweet, definitely not familiar. "Okay, we don't have that."

"Wonderland's missing out," Alice says, wrapping her hands around the cup.

"That is true. Two things so far that put your world above Wonderland. Well, one thing, and one person, which is much more important, so there's that." He's pretty sure he sounds like a babbling idiot, but it's worth it when Alice smiles at him.

"I guess you didn't exactly pack when you left," she says. "How long are you planning to stay?"

"How long—? Possibly…indefinitely? Cities are kind of my thing, doesn't really matter which one, and it's not like I had anything important to bring with."

"Hang on, where did you sleep last night when I was in the hospital?" Alice asks, frowning.

"Hm? Oh, the warehouse—you know, same place you popped out of. There's—not quite a base, but it's not bad."

Alice's eyebrows go up. "So…an office or something?"

"Well—I wouldn't call it an office exactly—"

"Is there a _bed_ ," Alice says.

"There's…well, a storage closet, basically, is what it is. It's a storage closet with a couple blankets inside. Plus some other stuff, it's not like. An entire closet for a couple blankets."

"Okay, no, you're staying with me tonight, we've got a couch, that's better than sleeping in a _warehouse_ on the _floor_. I should've—dammit, if I'd known you were there—"

"Whoa, hey," Hatter says. "It's really, _really_ not a big deal. I've slept in way worse places for a lot longer, trust me."

"That doesn't actually help," Alice says.

"Okay, well, still true, still not your fault. Time was—although I admit it's been a while—I was doing great if I got to sleep under an actual roof."

Alice is silent for a moment before saying ruefully, "There's a lot I don't know about you, isn't there? I feel like we've been through so much together, but we never had a chance to just…talk."

Hatter takes another sip of Earl Grey tea. "Look at that, you've deduced my cunning plan. So…what do you like to do, when you're not falling through looking glasses and overthrowing oppressive monarchies?"

"Oh, didn't I tell you?" she says, perfectly straight-faced. "Those _are_ my hobbies." She tells him about her work as a judo instructor, how she started learning and then teaching self-defense, because that was the only community she really found after she moved to the city as a kid; about her dad, a little, and life with her mom. He tells her what he remembers about his family (not a whole lot) but skips over how he lost them to one of the bigger epidemics that plagued Wonderland for as long as he can remember; about growing up on and off the street, and eventually getting into the tea business, which if nothing else was a way to meet some interesting people. They're not all happy stories by any means, but they're theirs, and the tea and coffee gradually goes cold as they talk. By the time they finally head back to Alice's place, Hatter's more sure than ever that he made the right choice. Wonderland is home, but here, with Alice, learning her city and really getting to know her—that can be home too.


End file.
